Chapter 2 · Practice 1 of 3
Get genuinely fluent with at least one assistant or agent
From Use AI tools well
Why it matters
Many developers have tried several AI tools a little. Fewer know one well: its instruction files, its permission settings, how to give it a task it can verify, and when to start a fresh session. Depth with one tool transfers to others far better than shallow use of many.
What fluency looks like in practice:
- You can give a task with the files, constraints and a check it can run.
- You know how to make it plan before it writes code on larger changes.
- You recognise when a session is going in circles and restart it.
- You keep generated changes small enough to review.
The AI coding assistant best practices guide covers these techniques in detail.
Do
- Pick one tool your team supports and learn its advanced features
- Practise giving tasks a check the tool can run
Avoid
- Switching tools every week and never learning one properly